Damon Campbell - Dutch Bros. From Chicago to Eugene

This episode delves into the unexpected depth of bumper stickers, exploring their meanings as reflections of identity, humor, and community spirit in places like Eugene. The candid conversations detail experiences related to kindness, dark humor, and even personal growth through martial arts and baking. 

• Analyzing humorous and thought-provoking bumper stickers 
• Discussing the cultural context of kindness and community 
• Diving into contrasts in customer interactions across cities 
• Reflecting on the meaning of inspirational stickers 
• Exploring humor as a coping mechanism through dark humor stickers 
• Sharing personal stories about martial arts and baking as transformative experiences

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Transcript

Speaker 1 0:01

Welcome to the Five Bumper Stickers, an interview project that offers glimpses of American culture and society by asking people about bumper stickers. Such a baker you're, such a oh thank you so much is it? Is it something that you baked? Actually chocolate chunk cookies? Do I pronounce it right? The mon? I'm always worried that I say the demo daemon, daemon, desmond demon.

Speaker 2 0:33

I've been called way worse. It's fine, but yeah, it's the mon.

Speaker 1 0:36

okay, I'm trying to go to that, brothers, because I know that, uh, you don't take coffee, but uh, uh, maybe a tea, maybe a hot tea or something, or Maybe, if they have hot chocolate, oh hot chocolate.

Speaker 2 0:46

That looks like an idea. I'm not a caffeine person, but I love my desserts.

Speaker 1 0:51

Oh, sounds great. Oh, by the way, did you buckle?

Speaker 2 0:53

up. I did. The first thing I do when I get into a vehicle is buckle up.

Speaker 1 0:57

Because, look at this bumper sticker, I found this one that says buckle up.

Speaker 2 1:09

It makes it harder for the aliens to suck you out of your car. I mean, that's assuming you're trying to evade the aliens.

Speaker 1 1:13

Maybe it's a rescue, I don't. It's fun something. No, why do you think that? Do you actually believe in like aliens or no, or something?

Speaker 2 1:20

somebody that visited us one day, or I, I mean I, I find it difficult to believe that in the entire wide universe we are the only place with life, like it's that. That would be weird to me.

Speaker 2 1:31

So somehow, yeah, there's something over there that it's like this is the only block with trees on it, like no, there's got to be other trees out there somewhere. Like come on, come on. Oh my gosh, I can't imagine if they were intelligent that they would come here, but but they've got to be out there right, that's a good one.

Speaker 1 1:48

Is there a bumper sticker that you found interesting, that, for example, that you've seen, like around Eugene, that you said hey, oh my gosh, look at this bumper sticker?

Speaker 2 1:58

I mean, there's a lot of great bumper stickers around.

Speaker 1 2:00

Oh sorry, hi, how are you Good? How are you doing?

Speaker 2 2:05

Great I think that he wants what. Do you want? A hot chocolate? Yes, can you all make it with actual milk?

Speaker 3 2:09

hot chocolate.

Speaker 2 2:09

Yes, yeah, made with milk, not like water yeah, we make it with milk yeah, yeah milk what was that whole milk?

Speaker 3 2:16

yes, yes, thank you.

Speaker 1 2:19

You know the problem if you don't say the size they're gonna bring you like this giraffe.

Speaker 2 2:22

So what size small? Please how small is a small?

Speaker 3 2:30

it's about like this small oh, that is appropriate. Yes, okay you have.

Speaker 1 2:34

You have the option of I always say, kids, kids size yes, kids, that is way too small. But then don't bring me that colorful, the colorful cup, no because I'm kind of clumsy zippy cup no, no, no, whatever. Small hot chocolate, small, let's do two please okay yeah, do you want any? Flavor adding just flavor of chocolate like dark chocolate?

Speaker 2 2:59

yeah, do you have cinnamon?

Speaker 3 3:00

you could dust on it oh yeah, we have some cinnamon sprinkles. Oh, you can dust on.

Speaker 1 3:03

Oh, you see, yeah, I was joking with it, but there is actually flavors.

Speaker 3 3:08

Do you want cinnamon on top as well?

Speaker 1 3:10

I'll be fine, okay, thank you so much, thank you 5.90. 5.90,. How is your day?

Speaker 3 3:16

It's been pretty busy today. We've had a lot of huge orders, a lot of like hundred dollar orders today wow, wow very hundred dollars lots of lots of drinks today that's awesome.

Speaker 1 3:29

Thank you, have a good day, bye-bye.

Speaker 2 3:32

You know, they just remodeled this, uh, this dutch bros, oh my god. Yeah, it's all corrugated around the side so it looks like a train freight car almost yeah, you know the bumper sticker that that I found when we first moved here.

Speaker 1 3:48

That says Dutch Moms and I thought, wow, there is this group of women from Holland that they meet, sometimes A cultural enclave Dutch, yeah. But now I see that it's about the Dutch brothers.

Speaker 2 4:05

Yeah, I mean. So. You asked, like what bumper stickers I've seen around and I thought, yeah, I mean. So there's so many interesting bumper stickers that you passed on a daily basis, especially when I bike around, like it's hard to nail one down. I will say that a lot of them have to do with, like, the different businesses people here support. So you see a lot of Dutch bros, bros. You see a lot of people with Jerry's bumper stickers and it gives you a sense of what people feel comfortable letting people around them know that they like don't want to use the word tribal, but it kind of is like this is my team, this is why I represent. You see it with sports. You see it with politics, you see it with Starbucks versus Dutch Bros. Like this is who I represent. Hmm, I think that's what bumper stickers represent for a lot of people.

Speaker 1 4:44

Fantastic, Great, and oh, look at this one. It says don't give up. Oh yeah, I think this one, uh, uh Luckily some ones are good messages, not just that one that says hey, don't tailgate. You know, I have, I got good breaks, so this one, don't give up. Do you think that is somebody that just wants to make sure you keep on going? Or you know, I mean, it might be a message for everyone around them as much as for themselves.

Speaker 2 5:17

I mean, it might be a message for everyone around them as much as for themselves. Like there's always reasons in life or things in life that make you question what you're doing, the direction you're going, what's going on around you. And it's important in most respects to just keep going the course and not give up.

Speaker 1 5:35

And maybe they need that reminder as much as any of us do. Yeah, that's interesting that sometimes you think that people hey, how are you? Yeah, hey, great, how are you? Yeah, I just got two small hot cocos, fantastic, which one has the cinnamon? One had cinnamon, the red one, yes that makes sense. Okay, have a good meal.

Speaker 2 5:55

You too, thank you.

Cultural Differences in Everyday Interactions

Speaker 1 5:56

Bye-bye, cheers, cheers With Eugene hot chocolate. Do you think that people in general are kind here when you go to buy your vegetables at the store, or I don't know? I'm just surprised about how kind these guys are.

Speaker 2 6:11

It's always hard for me to distinguish between kindness and customer service. That's interesting, but I always have good customer service experiences here and people seem to be kind so you mean between being practical, efficient and and kind like friendly.

Speaker 1 6:31

You know where is the, where is the limit?

Speaker 2 6:33

that's. I mean, it's always a question I have and this is kind of off topic, but you've I don't know if you've ever been in situations where you go to a restaurant, the server's nice to you and your buddy's like, oh, she's into you and it's like, no, she's being friendly because that's her job, like it's. It's that kind of thing like, are they being kind, are they being good stewards of their organization and offering good customer service, or is it both?

Speaker 2 6:53

oh so you see, sometimes like that you're talking maybe about how fake kindness not even fake kind, it's just the expected level of respect for a person that you're interacting with as a customer and a purveyor of resources or services. Like of course I'm going to be nice to you. You're a human being and you're also buying my stuff. Why would I not be nice? Okay?

Speaker 1 7:13

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's interesting, I think, one of the positive things coming from Europe, one of the positive things of the US in general. But I mean it's really like people are very customer service, very well oriented, and we see it when we go back, especially like my wife like, oh my gosh, like they're not like making you feel good that shopping is a good thing. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever, you feel good that shopping is a good thing. Yeah, yeah, whatever you came, did you find a big difference because you came from Chicago? No, did you find a big difference from the Chicago? Kindness to the Oregon?

Speaker 2 7:53

nice, yes, so in Chicago people are people can be pleasant and respectful and civil to you, but it's very much a factor of like hey, we're engaging in this exchange because you need a product, I'm providing the product to you, I'm we're both being nice to each other because we're engaged in this exchange. You have a great day here. It's so outright friendly that when I first got here I thought people were trying to like rob me or something.

Speaker 1 8:21

It's like all right, right, I don't know this person.

Speaker 2 8:23

I can't know them. I just showed up and they're talking to me like we've met before where are the? Copses like this is weird, and over time I'm not gonna say I've become less paranoid about it, but I've become more accepting of the fact that people here are just nicer culturally.

Speaker 1 8:39

I see. So you, chicago, you are not used to this. After after shopping conversation, like I don't need that, I got to go back home, like I've paid and my stuff is in my bag and I'm holding it.

Speaker 2 8:54

You're still talking to me, though I can see you, Like I could see, being friendly when I'm still holding my money. But now you have it and I have my thing and you're still engaging in this conversation. Oh, you want to be talking to me. This is weird. It just took some time to get to that, to the point where I was like oh, people here just talk to people. Oh what? What did you see? It said caring, not killing, and I believe the acronym on it was EPCC. I don't know what that stands for.

Speaker 1 9:19

Oh, caring, not killing. Oh, we just saw it. Now I'm going to assume it's environmental. Ah, from, instead of like cutting trees down, yeah and yeah, good, good, good. I found one another bumper sticker driving around Eugene that says love where you live. Is love where you live. Defend what you love, is it like? Probably, well, be you know, be consequent with the way you think. No Like, or what do you?

Speaker 2 9:52

think. I think it's really easy to take the word defend and turn it into something positive. You defend something from attack, but that's a really open-ended concept. Are you defending it from attack? Are you defending it from change? Some change is just change, but some change is progress. Are you defending it from progress? You might be an enemy of the place you're at. It depends on what you're defending and what you're defending it from. Maybe your place needs to change.

Speaker 1 10:15

That gym that you go with Heather? What's the name of the gym? Art of War, mixed Martial Arts? It's downtown Eugene here. Why do you like it? Is it different from a normal, like CrossFit or normal gym?

Speaker 2 10:30

I've never done a CrossFit gym and so this kind of ties back to the bumper sticker. Kindness is my religion, it turns out martial arts are my religion. Art of War, Mixed Martial Arts is a mixed martial arts gym. They have weights, they have different stuff you can do, but they also have classes. They have wrestling, they have boxing, Muay Thai, Jiu Jitsu and you can go in and learn whatever martial art or selection of martial arts you'd like to. That is offered there, and over the last six years of training pretty consistently, I have discovered that martial arts training has helped me improve, like physically, mentally.

Speaker 2 11:05

I'm able to deal with real life situations in a better way. Like someone might say something that I don't appreciate in a meeting and, you know, like several years ago that would have really bothered me. Now it's like you know what? Yesterday there was a fully grown, adult man on my back trying to choke me into unconsciousness and I dealt with that and it was fine. This person made a snarky remark to me. This is not something I need to get upset about. It puts things into perspective. Wow, I love it.

Speaker 1 11:31

Snarky, snarky, snarky. How did you say that? A snarky comment, snarky comment? Oh, thanks, thanks, because I'm still learning all these made sentences. I love it. So snarky comen. It's like oh futiles. In Catalan we say I think I know what you mean. A not very important thing, no, something that will go by.

Speaker 2 11:50

Yeah yeah, it just rolls off your back because it's like it's not that serious it's, it just puts things into perspective.

Speaker 1 11:57

In Catalan we say cunilet d'Indians. Do you have a sentence for that? In English, like the bunny, oh, the bunny that you put on the bike. Yeah, how do you say?

Speaker 2 12:05

that, oh wait, not bunny in flat.

Speaker 1 12:08

No, like a race, and you put the bunny and the dogs go after it.

Speaker 2 12:12

Okay, I don't. So I know, like at the dog racing track, I've seen what you're talking about.

Speaker 1 12:16

I don't know that we have an idiom for that idiom for that, but I don't know that we don't I just don't frequent dog racing tracks, so I don't I'm not been exposed to it, so if we keep on driving around eugene and looking for bumper stickers, we can find sentences like this one don't bust the crust, okay what does?

Speaker 2 12:37

don't waste the crust mean, my initial thought was pizza, but of course you have to bust the crust if you're eating it. My next thought was crust punks. Like don't bust crust punks, but I don't know enough about that subculture to comment on it. But I would totally bust a pizza crust.

Speaker 1 12:54

So it might be related to cooking and there's no like a metaphor. My first thought was cooking, but that's what I do so, uh, do you have to bust the crust to have a yeah to do?

Speaker 2 13:08

a good. Uh, yeah, you do. If you make a pizza, you've got to cut the crust. If you make bread, you've got to score the bread before you even put it in. That helps produce the crust to make it spread evenly, but you gotta bust the crust oh my gosh.

Speaker 1 13:18

Yeah, I remember that. Now that you say that you are a baker, the bread that you make. What is the secret of your bread?

Speaker 2 13:28

the mon, having nothing else to do. Sourdough bread takes like three days to make from start to finish. It's a lot of inactive prep time I love it, I mean.

Speaker 1 13:36

So sometimes this is the great uh metaphor for other things also, when you say what's your secret and say well, that's all I'm doing at that moment Not being present, it's my meditation. Oh, so it's just all about being patient. And then, oh my gosh, I remember that that was real bread.

Speaker 2 13:56

Yeah, Yummy bread. I mean, it's like it's breaditation, it's Breaditation. Because you, it's you're taking flour, water, salt and yeast and over time these things come together and they form gluten, bonds and everything and become bread. And there's a point where you're massaging these things together and you can feel all right, it's water, it's flour, it's salt, it's yeast, and at a point it turns from those separate ingredients into just dough, like you can feel it happen in your hands. And it's the kind of thing that you've really gotta be tuned into to really feel.

Speaker 1 14:23

Wow. So it's like this transformation that you're experiment there and to wait for the moment, it, even like, adds value to your craft.

Speaker 2 14:33

No, yeah, cause you know in that moment like, oh, there it is, it's dough now.

Speaker 1 14:38

The other day I was driving and I really was shocked. I said, am I reading this bumper sticker right? I really was shocked because, look, it says don't honk at me, my mother is dead. Do you find a reason why somebody would like to share this private feeling with?

Speaker 2 14:58

the wall. Different people have different senses of humor, Like it's oh it's like dark humor.

Speaker 1 15:03

Yeah, it's dark humor.

Speaker 2 15:05

Someone thinks that that's funny.

Speaker 1 15:07

So you think this level of humor, so you think that this person was really trying to be funny with this sticker because it didn't make me laugh.

Speaker 2 15:21

I mean, you know you got to know your audience and the trick with a bumper sticker is the world, or at least the world around your vehicle is your audience and you got to hope that they respond positively to it or don't notice it. Maybe this person thought it was funny, maybe it's their form of gallows humor and them coping with the passing of their parent. I don't know. That's not a bumper sticker that I would use, but I don't even have a car, so yeah, your car is your bicycle.

Speaker 1 15:45

No, yes, I saw it. That's great. So in eugene you can really live just with with uh walking and biking well it's.

Speaker 2 15:54

It can be challenging at times, like a costco. Run on a bike is just not something you want to do. I've taken home boxes of 25 pound boxes of butter home on the bus. That's not fun, but you know you can get around if you need to. But from just going from place to place point a to point b quickly you can't beat a bike like. I've raced heather from her place to mine and made it to my place in the exact same time she pulled up oh yes, and it's there uphill that way.

Speaker 1 16:16

Yeah, oh my gosh, well, no, great thanks. So much the one for this conversation. It was really great that we had a great hot chocolate, but at the end of the interview I always finish just asking one question. So I just want to ask you know, if you don't have this car as we were talking, ask you know, do if you, if you you don't have this car as we were talking, but if you had a car, or if even behind your bike, if you had a car and and you wanted to put a bumper sticker behind your car, um, is there a sentence or a bumper sticker that, uh, that you would design and and put it behind your car?

Speaker 2 17:03

So if you notice like I don't wear a whole lot of like, like logos and stuff, right, when I had a car I didn't have one on there. I don't have any stickers on, like my bike. The one place I do put stickers is my water bottle. Oh, wow. So this is like my version of bumper stickers. I guess. Oh, don't be scared, hom scared. Yeah, we got a Nick Diaz sticker. We've got mixed martial arts stuff. We've got a suspicious sticker. I love it. We got the cookie, cause I make cookies. Yeah, we've got murder yoga, cause I like. So, like bumper stickers, I'll take a picture of that.

Speaker 2 17:33

Yeah, sorry I mean stickers like tell a lot. Stickers, logos, et cetera. Tell people a lot about you, and I like to play things close to the vest. People generally need to ask me what I'm thinking or what I'm about in order to know. Otherwise they can observe my behavior and figure it out. So I don't want people to just look at me and go, oh well, he's about this, this and this.

Speaker 2 17:51

They should need to observe my behavior or talk to me before they can form any kind of an opinion. So I probably wouldn't have a bumper sticker, and if I did, it would just say something like me oh, I love it.

Speaker 1 18:02

I love it me because it's like get to know me before before I, before you assume that that I before before. Uh, somebody puts me in a box like how, how I think or how I see right oh, this person supports this.

Speaker 2 18:18

Well, he likes this, this and this. Like they've already made a decision about who I am based on my Dutch Bros sticker or whatever else. Whereas this thing is hidden in my pocket they can't see. If they want to know something about me, they've got to ask, they've got to watch what I do.

Personalized Bumper Sticker Appreciation

Speaker 1 18:30

They want to know something about me. I will put the bumper sticker me behind my car. Yeah, wow, I love it. Thank you so much, damon. So much the mom, thanks. We are almost at your house so I'm gonna drop you off here and I really, really appreciate your time. Thanks for this time. With the wonderful hot chocolate Buckle up, it makes it harder for the aliens to suck you out of your car. Dutch mom, don't give up Love. Where you live, defend what you love.

Speaker 2 19:04

So I probably wouldn't have a bumper sticker, and if I did, it would just say something like me.